Drastic keeps hanging during loading screen

[CutMaster.Claw]

Hello guys,

never had any issues with drastic, but since yesterday not a single game works anymore. Trouble started when I moved my roms-folder from storage/sdcard0/NDSRoms to storage/sdcard0/Download/NDSRoms. Since then loading a rom, no matter which one, results in being stuck during the loading screen (the one with the gyro sensitive sphere in the middle and the rotating 'loading').

Nevertheless I'm still able to access the menu and I can do pretty much everything, but won't come any further than this black screen with the loading logo. What I did attempting to fix this issue is the following: uninstall / re-install || clear cache / data || tested with both runtimes, dalvik and art || and finally did a complete 'factory reset'. Still no success - nothing helped fixing this.

What's pretty interesting: I just found out, that using 'astro file manager' to start a *.nds file works by opening a zip-file and double-tapping the rom inside. The according game starts the usual way.

Any idea how to fix this, so I'm able again to load a game the way it's ment to be by loading using the menu inside drastic? Thanx for any help in advance.

By the way: Drastic worked like a charm with the art-runtime - had no problems at all and tested really a lot of roms.

My hardware running Drastic, showing up this problem: Asus Google Nexus 7 2013 32GB LTE || Kitkat 4.4.2 Build KOT49H

And keep up the good work - you did an incredible job, the emulator is simply awesome!

[Exophase]

Have you tried loading unzipped ROMs? The comment about it working if you load it from the file manager app makes me wonder about this.

[CutMaster.Claw]

Hi there, thank you for the answer. In fact I was also some kinda surprised to see it working this way... While unpacking one of the zip-files I stumbled across the naming of the packed file: I multi-renamed my roms in one quick sweep using total commander, making all of them matching my personal naming convention. I like to have my files named only with uppercased letters, because I can read them much better. I'm 41 years old now and my eyes suffered a little over time. ; ) I accidentally also renamed the suffixes, so they were not *.zip, but *.ZIP instead. Obviouly drastic has some trouble with uppercased suffixes - I can tell for sure because: It worked after renaming the zip-file to *.zip again!!! : D File names in drastic's rom loading browser also changed colors after the treatment from black to red. Hadn't seen this before.

So, maybe this information is useful for you and you can fix this issue for a future release, so noone else will be facing this problem. Maybe it's also a kinda android thingie (I'm completely new to this, since I got my tablet just a week ago or so), windows never had any problems with uppercased suffixes.

I'm very glad you could point me into the right direction with your answer. Many thanx for that! Would buy you a beer - but that could be some kinda difficult: 'cause I do live in germany. ; )

This goes pretty much off-topic, but when I do have the attention of the mastermind himself right now; ; )
A brief proposal for future releases: Have you guys considered a rom loading browser with possibilities to change from list to grid view and sizes of the icons and so on? You surely get the idea. Would highly welcome it. ...and the big bang in space would be having a folder.jpg inside a zip-file to see the original cover of the actual nds game...

[Exophase]

Okay, that explains it I guess supporting case insensitivity on the file extension never occurred to us. I agree this is something we should probably incorporate.

Lordus actually does all user interface work, so he'll have to get back to you on different display options.

[Lordus]

Improving the game browser is on my todo list, including grid view etc. and a search function.

[CutMaster.Claw]

@Exophase: Understandable 'cause it's surely a pretty rare case, but now you are aware of.

@Lordus: Excellent, I'm looking forward to this feature.


Have a nice day both of you - and thanx for your help!

[TnA.Plastic]

To be honest,... I'm not sure how often we had to explain case-sensitivity of linux-based systems to those noobs, trying to softmod their PS2...
Windows and the noob-compfort... ^^